I take Eli's point that the US government was not always so pristine prior to the Bush administration, and that one could at least entertain "ticking time bomb" scenarios when extreme and unlawful tactics would seem necessary. That said, its clear from the Bush administration's example that when governments explicitly sanction these practices as being necessary in extreme cases, they tend to breed a culture of abuse. Hence, they are rightly and should remain illegal. The more important question is, why can't those who claim to have been acting in defense of the country admit that they broke the law in doing so? If they believe that torturing terrorists (and hence breaking the law) was necessary for the defense of the country, why don't they further defend the nation by admitting they broke its laws to protect it?

Love the google ad on the side: Established Men
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I <3 the first 9 minutes of this so much. Glorious.

Two great tastes that taste great together. I had to take exception to Lake's complaining about how the left always makes exaggerated comparisons e.g. comparing people to Hitler. That would have some plausibility if it were 2006 or earlier, but nowadays there's no way to avoid seeing the right flipping out and making ludicrous comparisons of its own.

plebiscite. wtf. what are you one Lake. is this the 1920's. the ahistorical nature works both way. aaaaacough cough Henry Kissinger.

I can't believe I'm going to discuss Twitter, but just this one point: Reihan talked about Twitter being this exciting new thing because of its "asymmetry" (his word); i.e., that unlike Facebook, you don't have to follow someone who follows you, which means, potentially, there can be someone who is talking to lots of people at once, while listening to almost no one in return!!! I fail to see what's new, let alone exciting, about this. This is the very model for virtually all media until Web 2.0 came along. On another topic, Eli took pains to point out that torture and other unsavory practices did not begin with the Bush Administration. I don't think most of his facts are subject to dispute, but his attitude comes awfully close to the saying two wrongs make a right. I am not saying that Eli got to this point, but his argument only needs to be taken one more step to get there. The better attitude to have is one that states flat out that what was done in the past was wrong and we're not going to repeat it, same as with FDR's internment policies or Lincoln's suspension

Eli,
Corpses spend no riches and blend with no bitches. For a real counterinsurgency, you must shield your friends from the enemy. To make your policy connect, police can't just serve, they MUST protect. Axis of Real, in its breadth and length, as diplomacy, must be backed by strength.

Euthanasia was discussed as being something that should only be done informally (outside of the law ) or it will be corrupt. here is an idea Reihan, take a look at the state of Oregon. have there been ANY abuses of this law? no? but it has helped thousands of people (most of whom like to have the option, but not use it). its nice to just have a baseless, uninformed opinion that ties in well with your pre-existing worldview, reihan, but in this case we have a real life example - so ya know, maybe get a little informed even if it does challenge your assumptions.

Quoting popcorn_karate: Euthanasia was discussed as being something that should only be done informally (outside of the law ) or it will be corrupt.

here is an idea Reihan, take a look at the state of Oregon. have there been ANY abuses of this law? no? but it has helped thousands of people (most of whom like to have the option, but not use it).

its nice to just have a baseless, uninformed opinion that ties in well with your pre-existing worldview, reihan, but in this case we have a real life example - so ya know, maybe get a little informed even if it does challenge your assumptions.

Euthanasia happens all the time. When you're in the hospice and you decide to go off the feeding tube, that's euthanasia. Same with pulling the plug on the respirator. I don't want to get too personal here, but in my own family the option of real euthanasia instead of half-assed three week long euthanasia would have been a great comfort to the one who was dying.

Quoting bjkeefe: On Eli's dismissal that US torture, etc., serves a recruiting tool for terrorists, I grant him a bit; e.g., this is not the only recruiting tool, and yes, there are ways of appealing to young sadists that will continue even if the US completely cleans up its act. However, I think he's being disingenuous to pretend that the bad behavior of the US provides no incentive. I also think he failed to acknowledge that it's not just the core group of potential active terrorists that are swayed; the US's bad behavior creates more sympathy in the rings of society surrounding the active members. For someone who wants to rap about Snitches Get Riches, he ought not to have missed this aspect.

Eli's is still one of the dumbest and shittiest people around. He's not even consistent with his own might-makes-right bullshit. He like to throw America's power like it makes his own goddam dick bigger. You know what? Muslims have power too. If you rub American power in their noses they're going to use their power right back at you. And if you're playing by might-makes-right rules you can't fucking complain when they do. Keefe's right. There are

Viewing this I was reminded of two quotes from Chapterhouse Dune: "All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological
personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a condition to which they are quickly addicted." And " Sympathy for the enemy- a weakness for police and armies alike. Most perilous are the unconscious sympathies directing you to preserve your enemy intact because the
enemy is your justification for existence." If we are to take Eli's point that to further investigate the actions of the CIA and their enablers in the white house we must also look to the historical narrative of past administrations. Well lets examine that for a moment. Start with Operation Ajax in which the CIA conspired to enact a Coup d’état to overthrow the democratically elected president Mosaddeq, or perhaps the we can look at the Reagan administrations brilliant idea to funnel money through Israel to arm Islamic militants in their struggle against the Soviets. Oh yes and let us not forget Iran Contra. Now this is just a

Guess it all depends, If you live in Latin America and your family gets murdered by the CIA they are as evil as the Nazis. Once you start torturing you lose all right to govern and are as bad as any other Evil regime.

Quoting radmul: Guess it all depends, If you live in Latin America and your family gets murdered by the CIA they are as evil as the Nazis. Once you start torturing you lose all right to govern and are as bad as any other Evil regime.

You must care very little about human suffering and thriving if you ignore it completely in favor of an arbitrary and incredibly poorly thought out principle

I was a terror since the Maggie Thatcher era/ Trade Union passes, cutting taxes, squeezin' assets/
Smoking commies was a daily routine/ since 13, a Classic Liberal on the scene.

I never liked Eli because I find most of his arguments disingenuous in terns of how they seem so transparently designed to rationalize his own gut level dislike towards certain strains of liberal criticism of America and Israel. But I'll say this for him: He actually engages seriously with the most important arguments that the left is making, and addresses them head on. It's to his credit that he reads Glenn Greenwald and doesn't try to straw-man it too much.

Quoting kidneystones: I'd rather hoped Eli would have something to say about Somalia and Al Quaida.

There might be some other issue Lake is too timid on, but he was right to avoid this one because it's nonsense. I'm no fan of the ICU but there is no Al Qaeda link there. Notice that the most damning quote the Telegraph could get still disavows any connection to Al Qaeda.

Quoting Gabe W: I never liked Eli because I find most of his arguments disingenuous in terns of how they seem so transparently designed to rationalize his own gut level dislike towards certain strains of liberal criticism of America and Israel. But I'll say this for him: He actually engages seriously with the most important arguments that the left is making, and addresses them head on. It's to his credit that he reads Glenn Greenwald and doesn't try to straw-man it too much.

That's funny, my problem with Lake is exactly that he hammers on at the far left's worst objections to the neocon project while ignoring the best arguments of the regular left and the center. He's a grizzled veteran of The Global War on Straw. (Notice that he generally knows better than to try that shit on grownups like Heather Hurlburt). It's true, he does pay lip service to the idea of honest debate. I agree with you about the disingenuous transparent rationalizations though.

Quoting kidneystones: More nonsense? The Khobar Towers fell in Kenya well before the invasion of Iraq. Cheney and Bush played no part in the attack on the USS Cole. Obama's own general claimed last week that Al Quaida is operating in Somalia.

Your partisan reluctance to accept that Al Quaida does exist and operates in Somalia and other African countries despite the election of Mr. Hope and Change blinds you to fact.

Notice that those article ALSO don't say there's any sort of al Qaeda presence in Somalia. Calling the (successor to) the ICU Al Qaeda is like calling the Taliban the CIA. Partisanship has nothing to do with it, the status of Somalia isn't a particularly partisan affair. It's just that you have no idea what you're talking about and are hyperventilating about the scary Musselmen.

Quoting kidneystones: Actually, I'm not calling anyone anything. I'm citing articles in major publications. Your President is fighting an enemy his general identifies as Al Quaida, which everyone but you seems to agree is operating in Somalia and other nations in Africa.

Somalia is collapsing and Islamic extremists linked to Al Quaida are about to take over. That's fact. Meanwhile, you're arguing that these folks who have fought and trained in Al Quaida camps are not linked to Al Quaida in any way.

Ok.

Pakistanis are shitting bricks over the influx of real live Taliban in Karachi and other urban centers as the result of Obama's air-strikes. He's fighting the Taliban and Al Quaida, which according to you doesn't actually exist in Somalia.

Thanks for straightening us all out.

All the articles you cited disagree with you. Even you realize you're wrong and are trying to shift the argument ("linked to Al Quaida in any way"). No one except the most derangedly Islamophobic think al Qaeda is present in Somalia which is why none of the articles you've cited say anything of the sort edit: you realize Somalia isn't part

pampl, Quit being obtuse. Al Qaeda has been in the Horn of Africa, to varying degrees, since Osama bin Laden has been around. Bin Laden lived in the area for some time before moving to Afghanistan. Yemen is right across the water from the Horn of Africa for crying out loud. kidney, The Khobar Towers were in Saudi Arabia. However, Al Qaeda did attack our embassies in Tanzania and Kenya like you said, they just weren't called the Khobar Towers.

Eli, somewhere Jonah Goldberg is extremely upset that you didn't leave room to include him here.

Quoting osmium: Eli, somewhere Jonah Goldberg is extremely upset that you didn't leave room to include him here.

LOL! That was one of the sillier things that Eli said this diavlog -- the notion that it's particularly "on the left" that Godwin's Law is violated. Eli should avail himself of Wingnuttia Search, posthaste.

BTW, is there anything Reihan Salam isn't totally squishy about? Good god, you can't keep your oh-so-moderate cred if you're squishy on torturing people.
By the end of the episode all his gushing about Eli's virtues made me feel embarrassed for him.

Quoting kidneystones: That's the headline: Somali Extremists Have al Qaeda Ties by Ali Soufan who, as a FBI supervisory special agent, can probably speak with some authority:

This is what al Quaida looks like to an FBI agent dealing with terrorism in May, 2009. Your obtuse insistence that this article does not warn that extremists with ties to al Quaida are likely to gain power as Somalia implodes is an exercise in 'reality-making' worthy of the most devout Bushie. Little wonder you support Obama. Next you'll be telling us that Gitmo is already closed, there are no air-stikes in Pakistan, and that the combat brigades have been home for months.

Try reading the black print.

These "ties" are about as extensive as US ties to al Qaeda. Unless you're one of those guys who think the government did 9/11, there's no indication there whatsoever that al Qaeda is operating with or will flourish under the Islamist take-over. It's a splinter off an ethnic movement that's repeatedly turned down aid from (for example) Iran and Libya. It never talks about creating a global caliphate, it talks about invading its neighbors to create a single Somali nation. You're

Quoting pampl: These "ties" are about as extensive as US ties to al Qaeda. Unless you're one of those guys who think the government did 9/11, there's no indication there whatsoever that al Qaeda is operating with or will flourish under the Islamist take-over. It's a splinter off an ethnic movement that's repeatedly turned down aid from (for example) Iran and Libya. It never talks about creating a global caliphate, it talks about invading its neighbors to create a single Somali nation. You're comparing ethno-nationalists who are enforcing order on a chaotic region with religious anti-nationalists who try to create chaos. You honestly have to be really ignorant to buy this.

There's a great deal of evidence to suggest far more extensive ties to AQ than you are willing to admit. These people are radical Islamists, and they will use the country as a harbor for terrorists. This will not only imperil American security, but will also, to a much greater degree, destabilize Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania. Also, it will make fighting the piracy along the Somali coast all the more difficult.

Quoting cognitive madisonian: There's a great deal of evidence to suggest far more extensive ties to AQ than you are willing to admit. These people are radical Islamists, and they will use the country as a harbor for terrorists. This will not only imperil American security, but will also, to a much greater degree, destabilize Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania. Also, it will make fighting the piracy along the Somali coast all the more difficult.

Yes, that's the right wing boilerplate response, but as we've demonstrated here the "evidence" doesn't actually exist. It's just Telegraph headlines and feeble attempts at misquoting.

Quoting pampl: Yes, that's the right wing boilerplate response, but as we've demonstrated here the "evidence" doesn't actually exist. It's just Telegraph headlines and feeble attempts at misquoting.

Well we can start with the fact that AQ members including Fazul Abdullah Mohammed have been targeted and/or in Somalia. Then we can proceed to their ideology, which is rather similar to The Taliban's. Moreover, your exact defense, that they're trying to "restore order" to the country, could have been said of the Taliban. Yes, they are trying to restore order. Not the type of order that's going to make Kenya or Ethiopia comfortable.

Quoting cognitive madisonian: Well we can start with the fact that AQ members including Fazul Abdullah Mohammed have been targeted and/or in Somalia. Then we can proceed to their ideology, which is rather similar to The Taliban's. Moreover, your exact defense, that they're trying to "restore order" to the country, could have been said of the Taliban. Yes, they are trying to restore order. Not the type of order that's going to make Kenya or Ethiopia comfortable.

Al Qaeda members have been targeted and/or in the US and Western countries. That's a really dumb reason to conclude there must be cooperation between the US's government and AQ. Their ideology isn't remotely similar to the Taliban's. Your line about "restoring order" your last line have nothing to do with whether or not they have and will continue to harbor and support AQ.

Argument #1: Calling what the Bush administration did "torture" means that you're calling them Nazis, which is a violation of Godwin's law, therefore what the Bush administration did is fine and Glenn Greenwald is wrong. Argument #2: The US has tortured people all the time, therefore what the Bush administration did is fine and Glenn Greenwald is wrong. Argument #3: Lots of governments totally loved it when the Bush administration tortured people, therefore what the Bush administration did is fine and Glenn Greenwald is wrong.

Exactly.

Probably a good thing TBogg didn't watch this diavlog. (Don't miss the text under the image.)